Land at the site of Delaware's lone Revolutionary War battlefield will get new archaeological scrutiny and preservation.

More details will be revealed on Friday at the site of the Battle of Cooch's Bridge, where American forces exchanged fire with British soldiers under the command of Gen. William Howe, who had landed in Cecil County and was headed toward Pennsylvania.

Sixteen thousand British troops moved through New Castle County, and engaged Colonial troops under Brig. Gen. William Maxwell at Cooch's Bridge over Christina Creek near Newark on Sept. 3, 1777.

Perspectives differ as to how significant the encounter was. Some accounts label it a skirmish, while archeologist Wade P. Catts has argued that participants in the battle viewed it as a "sharp but hard-fought and bloody engagement," fought over an area ranging from what is now Glasgow to Iron Hill and the Cooch's Bridge area.

He said about two dozen soldiers died in the battle. Their gravesites are unknown, but are supposed to be somewhere on the battlefield. A monument on the site honors the fallen.

"Their sacrifice affirmed that Washington and the American Army would strongly contest the British advance to Philadelphia," the Delaware Department of State said in a news release about the preservation announcement.

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The late artist Jack Lewis added the Stars and Stripes to his painting of the Battle of Cooch’s Bridge, which hangs in Legislative Hall in Dover, at the request of two prominent Cooches, urging him to reflect the traditional – if unproven – account that the flag first was flown in battle there.(Photo: THE NEWS JOURNAL)

Members of the Cooch family hold that the American flag first flew in battle at Cooch's Bridge.